Many agencies and organizations require individuals to identify themselves or provide identification information associated with themselves. For example, states may require individuals who drive to purchase automobile insurance and to carry proof of insurance identification cards when they are driving.
The use of hardcopy identification cards does have drawbacks. For example, when the identification information for an individual changes, a new identification card must be issued, and many identification cards are only issued by the issuing agency (i.e., the account holder cannot create his own identification card). Often a new identification card must be mailed to the account holder, causing a delay of several days between the issuance of the card and the receipt of it by the user. Alternatively, the account holder may go in-person to the issuing agency, which may be inconvenient to the account holder as well as cause a delay in the account holder's obtaining an accurate hardcopy of the identification card. Hardcopy identification cards are subject to damage and can become illegible over time. The cost of issuing identification cards can be significant for issuing agencies; more durable cards may be more expensive to issue and less durable cards may need to be replaced more frequently. And issuing agencies must spend resources on providing employees to handle the issuance of new hardcopy identification cards.
To overcome the drawbacks of hardcopy identification cards, applications providing digital identification cards have been developed that are accessible on mobile devices. Applications on mobile devices, such as the iPhone® or the iPad®, have fast become a growing trend in the smartphone and tablet markets. The development of mobile applications (mobile apps) has drastically increased in recent years as more and more users of mobile devices gravitate towards the user-friendly functionality of a mobile app over the Internet browser. As a result, many businesses and organizations are developing mobile apps that include digital identification information. Insurance companies, such as GEICO®, are among those businesses developing such mobile apps. Such mobile apps are available to policyholders for the company's insurance products and services.
However, organizations that require identification information from individuals often have rules and regulations about the format of the identification information that they will accept. Because these organizations are familiar with hardcopy identification cards, the rules are often directed to such things as the formatting of the identification card, the font size used, the placement of certain pieces of information, etc. These rules ensure that all identification cards are uniform, and this uniformity allows the individuals checking the cards to efficiently find the needed identification information since the information can always be found in the same place.
For example, the State of New York may require that its drivers maintain automobile insurance that complies with its minimum liability limits, but it may not require the proof of insurance identification cards that explicitly state that the insurance policy meets the minimum liability limits prescribed by New York law. However, the State of Maryland may require that its drivers carry proof of insurance identification cards that explicitly state that the insurance policy meets the minimum liability requirements prescribed by Maryland law. An insurance policy holder moving from New York to Maryland must obtain a new proof of insurance identification card that complies with the new jurisdiction's regulations for both the content of the identification card and the formatting of the identification card.
Thus, there is a need to provide a mobile app that provides account holders a digital identification card that complies with organizations' formatting requirements and that can be updated with new identification information or to comply with different formatting requirements.